LinkedIn Polishes Its iPhone App To Look Like Facebook

LinkedIn came out with the latest version of their iPhone app today. As you might expect from a 3.0 release, the app has been much improved, namely in its user experience.Â In fact, it looks a lot more like Facebook’s iPhone app now.

As you can see, there is a new main screen that features 12 main buttons.Â Yes, this is just like the new Facebook app main screen that features big buttons.Â With LinkedIn’s you’ll get easy access to â€œAll Updates,” â€œStatus,” â€œProfiles,” â€œDiscussions,” â€œConnections,” â€œFavorites,” â€œInbox,” â€œInvitations,” â€œRecents,” â€œReconnect,” â€œIn Person,” and â€œThemes.”Â Of these, the Reconnect, In Person, and Themes areas are entirely new.Â Â Reconnect allows you to find people you likely know on LinkedIn with the click of a button. In Person lets you use the iPhone’s Bluetooth to easily swap contact information with any other LinkedIn iPhone use you happen to be nearby at a conference or event.Â And Themes allows you to change the color of the main screen icons â€” you can choose pink, orange, gold, and a bunch of other crazy colors to ugly-up your app to your heart’s content.

Previously, the app featured a more standard bottom-bar iPhone navigation where you could switch between updates, your inbox, search, and other elements. This new layout gives you access to a lot more information quickly. The updates areas (All and Status) has also been been made more Facebook-like as each now features a user profile picture next to each update. You can also now comment on each of these updates right from within the app â€” again, yes, just like Facebook.

It’s also now very easy to â€œstar” any profile to mark it as a favorite, to give you easy access to it.Â Doing this also creates a filtering mechanism for the update streams.

Find the 3.0 version of the LinkedIn app, available for free in the App Store here.